Club 3D MST Hub Review
Category : Multimedia
Published by Marc Büchel on 15.08.13
With the MST Hub, Club 3D has a device in its portfolio, that allows you to connect three displays on one DisplayPort 1.2 connector. In the end the system recognizes the three attached devices as independent displays, which is possible thanks to the so called multi strem technology (MST). DisplayPort supports MST since version 1.2. In combination with an AMD Eyefinity 6 capable card and the Club 3D MST Hub you can attach up to six displays even if the card doesn't offer six outputs.
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Back in 2010, when AMD announced their Radeon HD 6000 series graphics cards, they proudly announced, that these cards can cope with up to six displays even if they have less than six display connectors. In order to attach six displays to such a card a so called Multi Stream Hub is necessary. Meanwhile Club 3D has such a Multistream Hub in its portfolio and we’re now going to have a look at it.
| Page - 1 - Introduction |
| Page - 2 - Preview |
| Page - 3 - Closer look |
| Page - 4 - Conclusion |
Preview
| Page - 1 - Introduction |
| Page - 2 - Preview |
| Page - 3 - Closer look |
| Page - 4 - Conclusion |
A Closer Look
If you want to attach up to six Displays to one graphics card, it is crucial that this card supports DisplayPort 1.2 standard. From this version of DisplayPort onwards Multi Stream is being supported. In the end this means, that one cable can carry three independent signals.
Club 3D’s MST Hub is not only suitable for Gaming. If you connect it to a notebook you can easily connect three displays to it via only one DisplayPort. Another way to connect additional displays to a notebook is USB-to-VGA/DVI adaptors. For 2D content this works just find but if you want to display 3D you’re stuck, since it just won’t work. Another neat feature of the Club 3D MST Hub is, that the displays are being recognized as individual devices. Maybe you know Matrox’ approach, where a software spans one huge resolution over all connected displays, which is not always what you actually want.
A closer look at the Club 3D MST Hub shows that the 100 Euro device is basically a compact adaptor, which features four DisplayPort connectors. On one side of the thing there is one input and on the other there are three outputs. Additionally the Hub comes with a power connector and during our measurements we’ve seen that it needs about 2.5 Watt on average. When looking at the delivery we would have liked to see a DisplayPort-to-Mini-DisplayPort-adaptor in the box. If notebooks feature a DisplayPort connector then it’s a mini-DisplayPort in most cases.
Maybe you’re wondering now what happens when you plug the Club 3D MST Hub to an NVIDIA GeForce 600 or 700 Series graphics card. Since these cards support DisplayPort 1.2 too, it should basically work. In case of NVIDIA cards you’re limited to four displays per card. Furthermore you only get the option to use the displays as independent devices and you can’t span one big resolution over all the screens. If you want to do that, then you have to take an AMD card.
During our tests with different devices, we’ve seen that the Club 3D MST Hub works just great on new Haswell notebooks too. If you attach the Hub to a Haswell notebook, you can send a signal to up to three independent displays. Since Intel’s 4th generation processors support a maximum of three displays the internal notebook panel gets disabled.
| Page - 1 - Introduction |
| Page - 2 - Preview |
| Page - 3 - Closer look |
| Page - 4 - Conclusion |
Conclusion
With the Club 3D MST Hub there is a versatile tool, which allows you to extend the desktop in a flexible and easy to use manner. Furthermore you shouldn’t just look at this product from a gamer’s perspective. Especially if you’re in a professional environment, where you need to attach as many displays to a system as possible, then these hubs are just great.It’s also very practical that the installation is very easy and hassle free. Ever user should be capable of setting up the Club 3D MST Hub. Another useful thing is, that displays attached to the Club 3D MST Hub get recognized as individual devices, which leaves you with a lot of options.
When it comes to pricing we believe that this thing is worth it’s 100 Euro price tag. If you want to attach three displays to one DisplayPort output, with another solution, then you would have to spend quite a bit more money. If you now look at the pricing of USB-to-VGA/DVI-adaptor and you keep in mind that these things are not capable of displaying 3D content, you see that these cost about the same as the Club 3D MST Hub. From this point of view the MST Hub is very good value for money.
| Page - 1 - Introduction |
| Page - 2 - Preview |
| Page - 3 - Closer look |
| Page - 4 - Conclusion |